Barbelier
Senior Member
You've already got a good base with your weekly mileage. I started from not having cycled at all for 20+ years - can still remember having to go to bed after completed my first 10 mile session!Great post and good advice. I'm planning the same next May (solo ride) though would be interested in how much training is required- I currently do 60-100 miles a week commuting and genaral ambling about. I'm hoping to complete in 18 days which should be enough to include a rest day or two and cost in any mechanical failures. I'm not organised enough to book each B&B in advance so will carry a tent just in case (and my wife would quite rightly slap me if I expected her to book a B&B for me each day!).
Everyone has a different level of fitness, so difficult to be too precise. I started 6 months before my original start date, building up the mileage each week. I was doing short sessions during the weekday evenings longer session at the weekend. Kept a spreadsheet and set targets (yeah I know - a bit sad!) to motivate me to keep increasing the mileage. I built it up to a single day session of 100 miles and was proably doing 250-300 miles a week leading up to the start. In total I did about 1,500 miles of training. Also did a couple trips of 2-3 day overnighters to get used to doing back to back sessions and let me know what gear I needed to take.
Most important put the rack and panniers on the bike early on and start gradually filling them up to get used to the load. Makes a big difference. Practice as much hill climbing with fully loaded panniers as possible. 18 days should give you plenty of time to enjoy the trip.